By Chikondi Chimala, in Beijing, China

Beijing, September 3: Mana: President Dr. Lazarus Chakwera Tuesday morning met the Technical Management Team of Huawei Technologies led by Vice President Li Junfeng in Beijing, China.

In his remarks, Chakwera reminded the Huawei delegation that he was proud to have inaugurated Malawi's first State-of-the-Art National Data Centre in the city of Blantyre on 21st July, 2022, thanks to the successful execution of the Fibre Backbone Project by Huawei which helped to position Malawi on the global digitalization map, on par with highly developed nations.

Chakwera who was accompanied to the meeting by Minister of Information and Digitalization, Moses Kunkuyu, said Malawi had significantly benefited from the exceptional services that Huawei provides through cutting-edge solutions offered, ranging from smart devices to advanced digital solutions.

“My administration is also keen on collaborating with Huawei in the following specific areas of Smart Village Initiative for rural communities the company is implementing similar projects elsewhere in Africa, Establishment of technical training centres for ICT to help us upskill our youth in digital skills, including AI and cybersecurity, Smart agriculture solutions to support our large-scale farm initiatives, and Cybersecurity for Malawi's digital landscape,” said Chakwera adding that his officials are prepared to discuss further the issues and the potential areas of collaboration that he outlined.

The president also asserted his administration's unwavering commitment to the minigrid project as Malawi seeks to expand electricity access across the country saying he is exploring financing opportunities to scale the project based on the results of feasibility studies that identify numerous eligible areas across the country.

The Malawi leader also took the opportunity to request Huawei to explore financing opportunities in China for the project.

In an interview with the Malawi News Agency (Mana), Huawei Technologies Managing Director for Malawi, Gomez Gu, said his company was geared to support Malawi in digitalization, and power through microgrid solutions, especially for rural areas.

On his part, Kunkuyu disclosed that the government will soon launch the first Smart Villages project in the villages that will help increase the number of smart villages in Malawi thereby increasing access to connectivity and various online services in rural areas.

The meeting was a continuation of President Chakwera’s engagement with various Chinese Companies including Huawei on the sidelines of the Summit of Forum of China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) that runs from Wednesday up to Friday.

The 2024 FOCAC Summit will among others focus on building relations and cooperation in supporting Africa’s industrialization, energy and trade as a priority, talent development, accelerating agricultural modernization, agenda 2063 of the African Union, modernization and mutual learning among civilizations, political, peace, and security cooperation as well as poverty reduction.

FOCAC was established in the year 2000 to foster relations between China and the 53 African nations and the African Union (AU) and is held every six years while the minister’s conference is held every three years.

The 2024 Summit is being held under the theme, “Working together to promote modernization and build a high-level China-Africa community with a shared future.”